Need info for new gun

[FromTheShadows]

My father gave me an old japanese rifle from WWII as an early christmas present. Besides a needing a good cleaning and oiling, the gun is in excelent condition. i know that it is a 7.7mm. problem is, i have no idea where to get ammunition for it. once i pick the gun up tomarrow, i will know more about it. but does anyone know a gun store in phoenix az that sells 7.7jap? lone wolf said they can get it, but it is around $60 for 20 rounds. norma sells it on the internet for 16.49 a box of 20. can i get norma 7.7jap in phoenix?

 

[zerosignal]

Here is some that militarygunsupply.com sells, though i'm not sure if you want to buy stuff online. $20 for 20 rounds.

http://www.militarygunsupply.com/shop/item.asp?itemid=A77JP001

 

[AirForceShooter]

try the gun shows in your area

AFS

 

[FromTheShadows]

more info to share on my 7.7jap

Alright. So i now actually HAVE the gun. It is a Arisaka 99. well built, unlike the last ditch 99's. missing alot of parts but still functional. no lead arms for the anti-aircraft sight. stock has ben cut down. no upper wood part (forgive me, don't know what that is called). the mum is ground off, so it is deffinatly a surrendered weapon. no bayonet. does anyone know the aprox value of a gun like this? i figure it is near worthless to a collector. i intend to have it tapped and drilled for a scope, and the bolt modified so it will not interfere with a scope. mabey use it for a deer rifle. who knows. can't wait to shoot it. and i did find ammo locally. so no worries there. i have it stripped and am cleaning it as we speak.

 

[MatthewVanitas]

Greetings, welcome to the High Road.

i intend to have it tapped and drilled for a scope, and the bolt modified so it will not interfere with a scope. mabey use it for a deer rifle

Doing so would pretty much destroy any value remaining in it, and it still probably wouldn't be as good a deer rifle as a brand-new Savage w/ scope for $450 from your local Big Box store. You'd end up putting a couple hundred into it to get a funky pieced-together deer rifle that takes weird ammo, probably worth less on resale than the money you spent "customizing" it.

Is it missing any parts besides wood and the AA sight? If you ask around in the Rifle forum, you may be able to find a spare stock for your Arisaka, and could bring it back close to original spec. It'd probably make a much better historical shooter than improvised deer rifle, and certainly worth more.

Try running a search on the THR Search engine, by clicking the white word "Search" on the green band at the top of your screen. You might be able to find info on Arisaka ammo and spare parts there. There are zillions of sporterized Arisakas gathering dust on pawnshop shelves, and they're not worth much. Hope you have good luck restoring it to like-original condition.

-MV

 

[FromTheShadows]

Thanks for the help

Thanks for all the info guys. I am going to hang on to the 99 untill i have the money to restore it, even though at the moment they are not really worth all that much. oh, and by the way, my father just gave me the other arisaka, a type 33. my colection is growing without any monitary output on my part.
Oh, and does anyone have a sugestion for an extreme long range target rifle? nothing i have at the moment seems to cut it....

 

[MatthewVanitas]

I'm not a long-range Bubba myself, 500m is my current furthest, but I'll quote the standard line given to the question:

"By the time you're good enough to shoot 1000m, you'll know enough about rifles to know exactly what you want."

Hopefully someone will come along soon with a suggested starter rifle, but since I'm here now...

Were it me, I'd get a Savage 110 in .223 with a good-quality scope. You could plink with milsurp 5.56mm and buy affordable varmint/target loads for other purposes. Recoil would be minimal, and bore erosion not bad. There are plenty of folks using tricked-out AR-15s for 1000m competition, and every year thousands of Marine recruits learn to hit a man-sized target at 500m using beater M16A2s, military ammo, and iron sights. So a Savage 110 w/ good scope in .223 should be an extremely affordable option to hone your skills.

That's assuming you already have a .22LR. If you don't have a .22LR, the standard advice is to get one and shoot the holy heck out of it for a year or two, out to as far as you can shoot. Ammo costs 2c a shot, no excuse not to send hundreds or rounds downrange every trip. There's a ton of great buzz on the board about the CZ 452 rifle, which seems to be the hands-down favorite target .22LR for its price.

Run a search (I describe the process in my above post) on either of the above rifles to get more info. And don't skimp too much on the scope!

Now, floor is open to people with far more knowledge than I.

-MV